The Story of Dutchess County

James F. Baldwin, Ph. D., of Vassar College, speaking for

Education. Alexander C. Flick, Ph. D., State Historian; speaking on the

Act of 1683, under which the county was created. The Hon. Hamilton Fish, Jr., Member of Congress, speaking on the Period of the Revolutionary War in Dutchess. The Hon. Edmund Platt, formerly Member of Congress, speaking on the Constitutional Convention at Poughkeepsie in 1788.

Address at the Luncheon by: Miss Helen Wilkinson Reynolds on the Story of Dutchess

County.

Of the foregoing addresses, that made by Mr. Platt was printed in full in the issue of the Poughkeepsie Eagle-News for November 2, 1933, which is on file in the Adriance Memorial Library, Poughkeepsie; the address made by Miss Reynolds is printed in this Year Book; the others were more or less extempore.

At the conclusion of the address given by Miss Reynolds at the luncheon there was read the following special letter of greeting from the President of the United States. The audience rose and remained standing to receive the message sent by the Chief Executive.

THE WHITE HOUSE WASHINGTON

October, 30, 1933.

My dear Miss Reynolds:

I wish I could come to the Dutchess County birthday party on November first but though I cannot be with you all I shall be there at least in spirit and I hcpe that you will give every body the warm regards of a son of Old Dutchess who for the moment is very much immersed in national problems.

Of one thing I am very certain on this 250th Anniversary of the creation of our county—its good people are continuing

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to do their full and fair share in the progress of civilization and have not lost the spirit of the pioneer. Very sincerely yours, FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT.

Miss Helen Wilkinson Reynolds Dutchess County Historical Societ Poughkeepsie, N. Y. T

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THE STORY OF DUTCHESS COUNTY An Address made by HELEN WILKINSON REYNOLDS

At the 250th Anniversary of the County—November 1, 1933

It is with pleasure and with pride that we are gathered here today to celebrate the two hundred and fiftieth birthday of our home-county, a county youthful in spirit, if old in years, and carrying within its community- life the forces that make for continued growth and development in the future.

Already we have heard from so many friends, during our program in the Court House, that there is little for me to give you that is new. I can offer only a simple outline of the life-story of the Dutchess's County, with apologies if, in so doing, I touch upon points referred to by the speakers who have preceded me.

When I try to marshal my thoughts for a survey of the county's history, I find myself turning back in imagination to the seventeenth century, when sovereignty was held over this region by the Dutch from 1609 to 1664 and, after 1664, by the English. There were at first but three settlements in the valley of Hudson's great river—one on Manhattan Island, one on the site of Albany and one on the site of Kingston. At that time the river was the white man's highway. Its shores were thickly wooded. Only the Indian roamed the forests.

A day came, however, when men in New York and Albany became interested in the unknown, forested land along the river and they began to speculate in real estate on a large scale. It was during that wave of speculation that the river-counties were laid out on the map and created after the model of the shires in England by an Act of the Legislature of the Province of New York.

Of those original river-counties there were five: Albany, Ulster, Orange, Westchester and Dutchess; and, to a student of history, one of the important facts revealed by a comparison of them is that those five counties, each founded by white men as a new settlement, developed with many similarities but also with many differences. At first thought it might be supposed that any two sections of the river-valley would be almost identical in characteristics. But such is not the case. Look

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beneath the surface and it soon is plain that in this or that particular local influences have operated to produce regional dissimilarities.

To illustrate. After Dutchess County was created as a civil unit in 1683 the number of inhabitants increased for a time so slowly that the officials of Ulster administered the affairs of Dutchess, Ulster being at the moment the more populous of the two counties. Ultimately the scene shifted completely. Not only did Dutchess set up and maintain her own government, but she outstripped Ulster in population and, by the 1770's, had become the second county in the Province of New York, Albany (with immensely more territory) being the first.

The fact that in the eighteenth century the population of Ulster was more or less static, while that of Dutchess multiplied, is easily accounted for. In Ulster there are mountainous ridges, running north and south. The farms were in the valleys. Communication was difficult. Families were isolated. Customs became fixed. Traditions crystallized. Changes of any kind were few. Ulster became a conservative locality, in which much can still be found that is suggestive of the colonial period.

On the other hand, within the present boundaries of Dutchess the topographical features lent themselves to development and inter-communication. The hills were not too difficult to pass over or around; the soil was good; the area was well watered; all sections had direct access to the river. The result was that when land was offered for sale in large amounts people came in in number, moved about with comparative freedom and had some contact with the outside world. Thus traditions and customs were less fixed in Dutchess than in Ulster; there is less of the eighteenth century in evidence in Dutchess today than across the river; and the mental coloring of the population is different.

Comparisons such as this can be made between any two of the original river-counties and will show how like and yet how unlike any two are.

In the development of Dutchess County in the eighteenth century certain fundamental factors shaped the course of events. One (as we have just noted) was the nature of the territory itself,—the topographical features and the adaptability of the land for agriculture. Another was the river, an accessible highway for transportation and for commerce. And, thirdly, there were the forms of tenure under which land was occupied.

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The favorable surface of the county, within its present boundaries, has been mentioned but, before leaving the subject of topography, it should be added that the creation of Putnam County was undoubtedly occasioned by the natural features of that area. Dutchess originally extended southward to Westchester but in 1812 its southern end, which included the region of the Highlands, was set off as a new county, largely for the reason that communication was difficult between the hill-country and the more open portion to the north.

As regards the river, it is obvious that the part it has played in the life of this community cannot be over estimated. The documentary records of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries always speak of it as: Hudson's river and I like to revert to that original usage in the possessive case. A personal touch is given by it that links us with Henry Hudson, the man, much more definitely than the current designation: the Hudson river. Until the railroad was built in the middle of the nineteenth century the shores of the river retained, almost unaltered, the appearance that they presented to the first white men who came here. An occasional landing for sloops along the steep, wooded banks was the chief evidence that white civilization existed in the hinterland. Back of the forested shore-line white men settled, increased in numbers and in prosperity and, more and more, used the river for travel and for commerce. It was an essential factor in the social and economic life of this county.

Of the influence of Henry Hudson's great river upon the spiritual and emotional life of our people, who can speak adequately? Have not we who were born beside it or those of us who have elected by choice to live near it absorbed from its beauty and its grandeur a subtle something that has become a part of our very selves? Each of us has only to look into his or her own heart to know what an enduring and uplifting message the river has for us!

Beside the effect upon the life of the inhabitants of Dutchess caused by topography and by the river, it is necessary to consider the manner in which title to land was obtained.

When the legislature of the province of New York passed the act of November 1, 1683, which laid out on the map "the Dutchess's County" (another instance of the possessive case!), the area outlined was unexplored. There were Indians here. There may have been an occasional white hunter or squatter. But no white men were settled as residents

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and white men did not know their way through the woods and along the streams. At once there began a series of purchases of large tracts of land by men in New York and Albany, which continued until all of the present county was covered by Crown Patents that confirmed the title.

The purchases were made for different reasons. The Rombout Patent is said to have been acquired with the idea of making profits in furs and timber (although it was not ultimately used in that way). Colonel Henry Beekman obtained the Rhinebeck and Beekman Patents and transmitted the land to his descendants as an investment. The Great Nine Partners Patent was a speculative venture and the tract was broken up into homestead farms.

Part of the land taken up in Dutchess by settlers was held under deeds in fee simple,—that is: absolute ownership. Part was occupied under leases. There was no manorial land and Dutchess escaped the blight that some of the other river-counties suffered from under the manorial system. Dutchess did suffer somewhat under the leasehold system, which was akin to that of the manors, for where land was leased progress of all sorts was slow. It was the independent landowner, the man who was his own master, who created the prosperity to which Dutchess finally attained.

The first permanent white residents in Dutchess, for whose presence there is documentary evidence, were on the site of the city of Poughkeepsie in 1687. In 1700 there were settlers living on the site of Rhinecliff and soon after 1708 on the site of Beacon but in 1714 there were only sixty households established within our borders. A thin fringe of settlement near the river was all there was of Dutchess for a long time. The truth is that the patentees of the larger patents did not at once press the sale of their holdings and, until they did so, the population of the county increased very slowly.

It was the good fortune of the Dutchess's County, however, that it was never the scene of Indian warfare. The land was sold by the natives willingly, the white purchasers paid for it and the Indians gradually died out or moved away. Nor was there ever a trading post in Dutchess. At New York, Albany and Kingston trading posts were set up early, where the white men dealt with the Indians in furs, and at each of those places there was drunkenness and violence. Here, when settlers

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arrived, they came as home-makers and they developed a community of farmers.

In the last statement lies the explanation of the fact that at first there were no villages in Dutchess. In New England people migrated and settled in groups and the village was the unit. In Dutchess the single family and single farm were the units. Houses were widely separated. Only an occasional mill, or a blatksmith's shop, or a river-landing became a center, around which clustered a few buildings and, except for Poughkeepsie, where the Court House occasioned the growth of a hamlet, and Fishkill and Rhinebeck, each of which had a few houses near a Dutch Church, villages cannot be said to have existed here until after the Revolution.

It was in the second quarter of the eighteenth century, when the owners of the great patents made definite efforts to sell their lands, that there began to be a noticeable increase in the population of Dutchess. In the development of this country as a whole the frontier has always been a factor of importance and, until the present era, there has always been a place farther on for people to move to. And so, between 1725 and 1750, Dutchess was a sort of frontier. Families came here from New England, Long Island and New Jersey, from Albany, Ulster and Westchester Counties and Dutchess, from being in 1737 the seventh county in the province of New York in population, was from 1756 to 1775 the second in numbers, surpassed (as stated above) only by Albany County.

In extraction the people who came here then were American-born descendants of ancestors who had come to America from the British Isles and from several parts of the continent of Europe. The majority of the arrivals were probably English, with the Dutch second on the list. And so, of course, there was a local language problem. In the first place we have some place-names of Indian origin but rendered in English and Dutch phonetic spelling. In common speech there were English and Dutch and some German and in the county records the inter-play of the three is clearly revealed for spelling was not by rule, it was phonetic and the Englishman and the Dutchman each wrote down what he thought he heard the other say, with a result that is both amusing and puzzling.

Before the Revolution white men occupied the area that now constitutes Dutchess County for eighty-odd years, in which time the forests were cleared for agriculture, roads opened, grist-mills and saw-mills

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built, civil government set up and civil divisions laid out. The Board of Supervisors was the legislative body; there were executive officials, such as the County Clerk and others; and there were local courts.

Education was represented in that pre-Revolutionary period by dame schools and by local schools where the three R's were taught. It was not until the latter part of the period that a classical academy was founded.

There seem to have been no ecclesiastical quarrels. Theology did not interest the people, as it did in New England. The ministers were faithful pastors but apparently they did not greatly influence the intellectual life of their congregations. Every one belonged to some congregation and the churches were social rallying points. West of the center of the county the Dutch Reformed communion was preponderant; east of the center there were numerous meetings of the Society of Friends; here and there were to be found Lutherans, Presbyterians and members of the Church of England. But tolerance and harmony prevailed in this mixed community.

For the greater part of the period before the Revolution Dutchess County had but one resident lawyer, Bartholomew Crannell, who settled at Poughkeepsie in the 1740's, and to a large extent people here depended for legal advice upon lawyers in New York City.

There were several doctors in Dutchess before 1775 but medicine and surgery were in their infancy everywhere then; there was no medical college in this country; older men taught younger ones; the layman used simple home remedies whenever possible. In the Adriance Memorial Library at Poughkeepsie is a small notebook compiled in 1767 by Dr. Cornelius Osborne of Dutchess County which reveals in a vivid way how little scientific information the profession possessed at that time.

Political life was dormant in the period under consideration. Dutchess was represented in the Provincial Assembly for forty-two years (1716-1758) by Henry Beekman, who was the landlord of many tenants and who, as such, was practically a dictator of affairs. Shortly before the Revolution the irritation that the people long had felt in connection with the leasehold system became active and there was some excitement over that question. When the war broke out the county stood about two Whigs to one Tory and it is probable that the number of Whigs (who were the radicals of the day, demanding changes in an established

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order) was augmented by the dissatisfaction caused by the leasehold system.

During the War of the Revolution Dutchess County was an important place due to its geographical position. Possession of Hudson's river, from Canada to the sea, was the objective of the military strategy of the war. The British tried to take the river-valley. The Americans held it. The American defense was successful partly because of the defeat of Burgoyne at Saratoga but also because of the Highlands; the mountains presented a northern barrier which the British, occupying New York City, could not pass. Behind those beautiful hills, in comparative safety, the Americans established military centers at Fishkill in Dutchess and Newburgh in Orange, while the new-born state of New York made Poughkeepsie the seat of its civil government. From 1777 to 1783 Poughkeepsie was the capital of the state and, in 1788, there, occurred in the Court House of Dutchess County at Poughkeepsie, on the site on which the present Court House stands, that great event,—the ratification by New York of the Constitution of the United States. Had New York refused to join the Union, we are justified in believing that the United States would never have come into being as a nation, because the state divides the Atlantic seaboard into two parts and extends from the Atlantic north to the Canadian line. And so, Dutchess afforded the pivot on which our national existence turned!

Trying experiences befell the residents of Dutchess immediately after the Revolution, similar in character to those which have marked 1929-1933. There were altered values, trouble with prices and currency, trouble due to speculation and politics; but it may be helpful for us of today for it to be emphasized that the county weathered the storm of the 1780's and—as the difficulties waned—that it entered upon an era characterized by healthy growth and development.

As the adverse effects of the Revolutionary War diminished, a slow recovery set in in Dutchess and expansion took place on simple, sound lines. Many of the complexities of modern life were absent. Dutchess emerges to view as a community of native-born citizens and the period was essentially American. The farmer was the man of fundamental importance and for several generations agriculture was the base of the economic structure. The farms were productive; the farmer lived well; he exported grain, meat, horses and lumber to New York City and to the

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West Indies; the Dutchess County Agricultural Society was formed in 1806; bloodied stock was raised; locust trees were Cultivated to sell as timber and for plantings along the roads and near dwellings; the sloops on the river did a large business, carrying the farmer's exports and bringing back from New York City the manufactured goods that stocked the local stores.

As prosperity increased schools grew in number and improved in quality; several were of classical standard and from them the farmer's son went to college. The bar advanced so rapidly that the county became well known for its able lawyers. The College of Physicians and Surgeons was established in New York City and the medical profession at large took on new life. In 1806 the Dutchess County Medical Society was founded and • there was a general improvement in local practice.

The Revolution abolished the leasehold system and as a result freeholders obtained more independence, political influence was more diffused than in the day of large landholders and political parties began to form. In the first quarter of the nineteenth century the Hudson valley contained the older communities of the state; west and north of the river were many places newly founded; so that Dutchess County, playing a relatively important part in the river-valley, was more outstanding in the state than now. Among the residents of Dutchess at that time can be noted a Vice-President of the United States, Senators of the United States; a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States; a Justice of the United States Circuit Court; a Secretary of War; a Secretary of the Navy; a Minister to France; a Governor of New York; a Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of New York; &c., &c.

As the nineteenth century went on changes came. The Erie Canal was opened in 1825 and brought competition with western New York in grain and gradually the farms of Dutchess declined in prosperity. The use of water-power for mills began and villages appeared; the railroad was built and profoundly influenced commerce and transportation; and immigration of foreign-born peoples occurred in volume. There were economic ups and downs. The Civil War shook all to their souls' depths. Education flourished; the county was noted for its many superior schools and for the establishment of a college for women. Culture was in evidence; a high value was placed upon birth and breeding and good manners; social life was mellow and Dutchess was widely known as a

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place offering residential advantages. Perhaps to some extent it is true that the county was politically democratic and socially aristocratic.

Late in the nineteenth century industrialism appeared here and with it came the problems of capital and labor and other related questions. We are still too near those problems, still too near the World War and its aftermath to see in true perspective.or to understand the true significance of many things. Today, as we are gathered here together, we know that we are in the midst of the workings of mighty forces, social and economic, that are difficult to explain or to appraise. We are swept forward on the powerful current of an uncharted stream.

History tells us this, however. Always and ever in the past changes in outward things have come and have gone. Always and ever the inward principle of life goes on. As old forms disappear, life itself persists, clothed in new garments and offering new adventures in faith, new opportunities for achievement. It is a happy coincidence that today, November 1st, is All Saints' Day. We of Dutchess can look back to a long line of men and women, our spiritual forbears, whom we well may venerate. They made this county what it is for us,—a home-land, dear to our hearts. As they in the past wrought worthily and left us a valuable heritage, so may we meet the challenge of our day and pass Off that heritage, unstained, a bequest to those who follow us.

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PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT'S FIRST SPEECH OVER THE RADIO

On November 19, 1863, Abraham Lincoln delivered an address at Gettysburgh, Pennsylvania, which is famous for all time. Unfortunately there grew up in connection with it uncertainties regarding the time, place and circumstances of its preparation. Differing statements were made about the same and, as a result, long and earnest endeavor was necessary to ascertain the facts in part at least.

On March 12, 1933, Franklin D. Roosevelt talked to the American nation over the radio. It was the first time a President of the United States had spoken directly to the people over the air on a matter of vital importance to all. The conditions in the country that day were unprecedented. Like the address made by President Lincoln at Gettysburgh, the address by President Roosevelt was distinguished for simplicity and directness. President Lincoln spoke on a subject carrying an appeal to emotions and sentiments that spring eternal in human hearts. President Roosevelt dealt with an abstract subject, with which the general public is unfamiliar; in normal times the mass of the people do not try to understand banking. But on March 12, 1933, banking matters were filled with emotion and sentiment for every American man, woman and child. The epochal moment at which President Roosevelt's first radio speech was delivered, the clarity that marked his words and the impression he made upon the hearts of all classes of hearers are bound to place his speech in history in as unique a niche as that accorded President Lincoln's.

In the months that have followed the delivery of President Roosevelt's address various versions have appeared regarding the circumstances of its preparation. And so, to prevent the repetition and perpetuation of conflicting accounts, such as those relating to President Lincoln's speech, the editor of this Year Book asked the President if he would be willing to make a statement of the facts. That he has very kindly done and the Year Book here records for the benefit of historians in the future, as well as for the interest of its readers today, the following: THE WHITE HOUSE WASHINGTON

October 30, 1933.

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My dear Miss Reynolds:

Because you told me that there are many versions of how my first radio speech last March came to be prepared, I see no reason why the simple facts should not be told.

As you know, the Proclamation officially closing all banks was signed by me on Sunday evening, March 5th. Almost every bank throughout the country had already closed its doors, and the chief purpose of the Proclamation was to bring order out of a chaotic situation and give the new Administration a few days' opportunity to bring about an orderly re-opening of essential banking facilities under uniform principles.

During the following week the policy was established, the Special Session passed the necessary legislation, and there remained the one problem of explaining the principles and the policy to the average of depositors in the banks. It was of course obvious that the banks had been forced to close by the complete loss of confidence on the part of these average depositors.

I think it was on Friday that I asked three or four gentlemen connected with the Government to let me have in writing their thoughts on what I should say in a public radio statement. Each of these gentlemen gave me suggestions which were of course based on the point of view of the department or agency with which each was connected. On Sunday, March 12th, I read the suggestions, discussed them informally with a number of friends and came to the conclusion that the imperative purpose would not be answered unless it was understood and approved by the type of individual whom I thought of as the 'average depositor.'

This is what caused me to sit down at my desk and try to visualize the types representative of the overwhelming majority. I tried to picture a mason, at work on a new building, a girl behind a counter and a farmer in his field. Perhaps my thoughts went back to this'kind of individual citizen whom I have known so well in Dutchess County all my life.

The net result was the dictation of a radio talk to these people —all of whom had their little capital or savings in some kind of a bank.

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I do want to stress one point, however,—that the restoration of confidence at that time was not due so much to any speech or pronouncement as it was to the inherent good sense, the inherent faith in the Nation, which was a fundamental of the overwhelming majority of people in every part of the Nation. Very sincerely yours, FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT.

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MORE ABOUT OLD BRIDGES And Related Things.

In 1741 Adolf Brewer of Bergen County, New Jersey, bought six hundred acres of land in Dutchess County, much of which tract is occupied now by the village of Wappingers Falls. The following year Adolf Brewer died and his property passed to his son, Nicholas Brewer, who removed from New Jersey to Dutchess and for many years operated a mill on Wappingers Creek near the falls. At the mill Nicholas Brewer built before 1764 a bridge over the Wappingers and, as this bridge was said to be "boarded up on the sides" (see: Road Book C, page 52), it was doubtless a typical cdvered bridge.

On February 28, 1819, a freshet of extraordinary force destroyed many mills on the Wappingers and carried away every bridge from Salt Point to the Hudson River. The bridge at Wappingers was immediately rebuilt. It was a covered structure with windows in the sides, as is shown by an old photograph of it and of the Yellow Mill, which picture is in the possession of Miss May Barlow of Wappingers Falls. I am indebted to Miss Barlow for data in the preparation of this article.

The bridge of 1819 at Wappingers stood until 1852 when it was replaced by a stone bridge, thirty feet wide. In 1884 the latter was widened to sixty feet and rebuilt with red sandstone, the present structure.

The land along the Wappingers Creek, purchased by Adolf Brewer, was originally a part of the tract for which a patent was issued by the Crown to Francis Rombout, Gulian Verplanck and Stephanus Van Cortlandt in 1685. The grant extended from the Fish Kil north along the Hudson River to a spot five hundred rods north of the Wappingers Creek. The land of Adolf Brewer was in the part of the patent which fell to the heirs of Gulian Verplanck when the tract was divided among the descendants of the three patentees. On April 4, 1777, Nicholas Brewer sold 422 acres to Matthew Van Benschoten, who on May 1, 1777, conveyed the same to Peter Mesier of New York City. Peter Mesier was a prosperous business man, possessed of property in New York. As he was a Loyalist his real estate in the city was confiscated by the American officials after the British evacuated the city but it was

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eventually returned to him. He moved his family out of New York to Dutchess and occupied the house and land near the falls of the Wappingers, which had belonged to Nicholas Brewer. The story is told that, owing to his Loyalist sympathies, his store at Wappingers was on one occasion during the heated war-period over-run by a mob and much of its contents destroyed.

After the Revolution Peter Mesier added to his land holdings in Dutchess and also bought the Yellow and Red Mills. These were flour mills of good size. The Yellow Mill is said to have had a capacity of one hundred barrels a day.

The house of Nicholas Brewer and Peter Mesier is still standing in the village of Wappingers Falls in a good state of preservation and is surrounded by what is known as Mesier Park. The house and park are the property of the village corporation, having been acquired by purchase from the heirs of the Mesiers in 1891. Peter Mesier died in 1805.

Although the history of Dutchess County covers a period of only two hundred and fifty years, still today many of the names originally given to small communities in the county have dropped out of use and been forgotten. Last year while I was hunting for information about our covered bridges I heard of an article in a newspaper of 1819 that described the freshet of that year on the Wappingers Creek. The article stated that the bridge over the creek at Franklindale was washed away. Where was Franklindale? It took quite a bit of research to determine that Franklindale was an early name for Wappingers Falls.

In going through Road Books of the county, items of interest have been found concerning certain roads and bridges as they existed during the eighteenth century and in the early part of the nineteenth. For these items, appended here, I am indebteded to Miss Helen W. Reynolds. 1744 September . . , Road Book B; page 1 Mentitm of the "brig" over the Wappings Creek . This may have been the bridge afterward called Dr. Thorn's bridge, because the entry refers to land east of the bridge owned by Abraham Swartwout and Dr. Thorn's title goes back to Swartwout. 1747, April 6: Road Book B; page 14. Mention of the "Brigge" over the Wappingers Creek, opposite the barn of Gilbert Paille.

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